Monday, September 29, 2008

Girly Hair

This is my middle daughter, my princess, the girl who loves girly hair! Sorry the pictures are not great but I was late for church and wanted to snap a quick photo. I dont think it turned out too bad but if I were to do it again I think I would use bigger sections of hair.





Now I know you are asking yourself: "Where did Mandy find the idea for this hairdo?" Well dear friends, I was blog stalking my cousin Marisa's blog and she has several "Little girl hair do blogs" listed on her blog. I listed I few I liked:


http://babesinhairland.blogspot.com/

Her girls are so cute!

http://piggiesnponies.blogspot.com/

Can I just say, "Oh my heck! The lady has talent and patient children."

http://cute2tryhairdos.blogspot.com/

Really unique ideas here, so great.

That's how we roll in girly town!

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Funny stuff my daughter says


The picture I posted has nothing to do with this post other than its a picture of my three girls. I just wanted everyone to see their cheesy grins while you laugh at the silly things the girls have said to me recently.

Today:
My youngest daughter (who is 4 years old) was looking that pigeons that have taken to sitting(& pooping)on top of our swing set while she and her sisters are at school. My youngest sent Shadow (our dog) outside to chase the pigeons but the pigeons were not impressed or threatened in any way by our small dog.

Since the birds didn't leave she started waving her arms saying,"Shoo Shoo birds."

She turns to me and says in a very serious tone, "I can be the scarecrow."

I had to laugh, how practical my girl is trying to keep the pigeons away by being a scarecrow.

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Meteor Crater, Navajo County Fair & Rodeo, Quading



This last weekend our family went to Holbrook and Show Low, Arizona, to spend some time with Kris and Stan (my in-laws.) On our way to Holbrook we stopped at Meteor Crater; this was very exciting for our family as we are big fans of Space Exploration and all things Space related. We took a quick tour of the museum and then went out to look at the crater.



We climbed back into the car and headed to Holbrook for the Navajo County Fair & Rodeo. Unfortunately, the rodeo started late so I don't have any pictures other than the picture of the arena. My camera doesn't handle the dark well. One of the best parts of the rodeo was when Lela participated in the Grocery race, this is where they put packages of stuff kids like to eat (chips, juice boxes, candy, etc) in the arena and a bunch of kids run out their and pick it all up. Lela sprained her ankle but she was a trooper about it. Our other favorite part of the rodeo was the bull riding. The bulls won hands down with only two riders holding on long enough to get a score. One rider did get stepped on pretty bad and most likely ended up with a few broken ribs but he walked out of the arena on his own power. Lela and I walked around the fair looking at the craft winners, their were some really beautiful quilts (sorry no pictures, got to respect the artists.) The girls fell asleep on the way back to the in-laws.


Okay now some of you who know me are thinking right about now: "WHAT??? Bull riding?!? Mandy watches bull riding ?!? Well not exactly, my parents got Lela interested in bull riding and then David got into it too. So yes, I watch bull riding with my family.

Oh, and just for the record, I do not own a pair of cowboy boots......yet.

The next morning on Saturday, we took my in-laws quads out for a ride around their property. Okay, "quading" is that a real word? I am not sure but lots of people own quads and go quading. In fact my in-laws hosted a really big quading jamboree recently with 350 people. Crazy! Who knew? Not me obviously. Here are some photos of the girls and David on the quads. Yes, I drove one of the quads, badly. In my defense, you have to use your hands to drive and since I have advanced carpal tunnel it really hurt to hold down the lever that was the gas for so long. Oh well, I'll just have to work on it because I have been told that I will be involved in quading expeditions in the future.







Friday, September 12, 2008

Photos, as promised

We are off to the rodeo tonight out in Holbrook, AZ, where we will be meeting my in-laws. The girls are all dressed up in their cowgirl boots and jeans. I promise to post pictures tomorrow because they just look so stink'in cute. But, before we run off to the rodeo, here are the photos I promised. This is only a smattering of what I have been doing. I have another mini album I will be teaching at the end of October, a Birthday Girl album I just need to photograph it. I am making cards, scrapbook layouts, and have plans for a large canvas as well. My printer is out of ink so I literally have 7 scrapbook layouts sitting on my desk waiting for journaling. No, I don't write out my journaling by hand most of the time because my handwriting has become less legible each year with the advance of my carpal tunnel but I do try because I want my girls to remember what my writing looked like before it becomes totally illegible. Okay now that I am off that tangent here is the pictures I promised.

This is the front cover of the Christmas Mini Album I am teaching in October at Scrap Happy Sisters. Its a 10 page mini book, I just really loved the papers by 3 Bugs In A Rug.


This is the Family Canvas I am teaching at my church's craft day in October. The Family letters are vinyl which is sweet because its so easy to work with.

The Recipes album is a gift for my mother-in-law, her birthday is this month and we will be seeing her this weekend.

This canvas is a project I started at CK Convention Phoenix in September of 2007. I just finished it in August 2008 but hey I got it done right? This will be a Christmas gift for my husband's grandparents.

See you tomorrow part'ners!





Thursday, September 11, 2008

Color Inspiration Card

I have this REALLY talented cousin, Kristina. She has an awesome blog http://www.kwernerdesign.com/blog and was recently asked to become a Garden Girl (for those of you not familiar with the online scrapbooking world let me tell you this is a HUGE honor.) Congratulations to my cousin, UR DA BOMB! She does a color inspiration challenges on her blog and I just haven't taken the opportunity to participate until now. Of course I had nothing in my stash that fit the color scheme so I just winged it. So here is what she chose:



And here is my card, which has probably missed the deadline for today (hey its the thought that counts right?):





Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Teaching classes, being a parent, & more

Where have I been, well I have been very busy with lots of things. I promise to start posting more of my scrapbooking work. I will do a post soon that shows all the work I have finished lately. I am going to be teaching a Christmas mini album class at Scrap Happy Sisters http://www.scraphappysisters.com in October. I missed teaching scrapbook classes so I jumped back in. (Again I promise photos will be posted soon.) I took a very long break from teaching classes because I needed to focus my energy on taking care of my children during the summer and deal with some things that related to the business that I closed. In a way, I needed to grieve for what I had lost. I was burnt out creatively and I needed to get back to reality, which unfortunately is often harsh so its doesn't leave much time for scrapping.

I am also helping out with my church's crafting day in October as well. I am supervising some projects and teaching a canvas class (photo to follow.) This is something I am doing for fun because I love the ladies at my church and love all the crafty stuff that we make each year; its kind of our "get-ready-for-the-holidays" crafting day.

What else I have been up to, well being a parent. What that means is dealing with with my daughters and each one is very different. My oldest daughter is struggling to adjust the rigors of 5th grade. She has two folders to keep track of, a daily planner to write in, she has to change classes two times a day, and she is also in band this year in addition to the usual- P.E., Art, Music, Library, & Computers. She has always done well in school but this year she has been struggling to be organized. Its hard to watch your children fail and know that you cannot fix it for them, you can only help them by giving them support and helping them deal with the consequences of their actions. This is the year things get serious for her, she has to learn that from now on this is they way life is going to be. She is going to have to grow up some and take on responsibilities that she doesn't enjoy. While this is a difficult time for her she still maintains her sense of humor, enjoys her favorite activity horse back riding, and is coming along with her flute lessons.

My middle daughter is struggling with reading, but was lucky enough to be put into a special reading program at school that will help her. We are also going to have her eyes checked to make sure her vision isn't giving her trouble. We will be reading, reading, & reading with her at home. Other than her reading troubles she enjoys school and is making new friends and is just a very happy girl. She joined the Shine Your Light Singers this month, we wanted to give her a chance to do several things at once. This group does singing, acting, and dancing; we are very excited to see how she does with it.

My youngest daughter continues to improve in her second year of preschool; her therapists tell me she is making good progress. I have to say how thankful I am that the state and school district I live in provides my daughter with so much assistance. I have not talked about my youngest daughters diagnosis on my blog a lot but I think it's important. Just in case you are new to my blog I will explain what I am talking about. Our youngest daughter was diagnosed with an Autism Spectrum Disorder in 2006. Most people know what Autism is but not what Austism Spectrum Disorders are and to be honest I cannot describe what they are in a short sentence other than to say that our daughter's particular disorder gives her trouble with sensory input and she has a moderate speech delay. If you want the full story e-mail me and I will share.

Back to my point. Our daughter has 5 therapists that work with her. She has an Occupational Therapist, a Speech Therapist, and Music Therapist that work with her at home 1 hour each week (that's 3 hours of therapy a week if y'all are counting.) At Preschool, she has a Speech Therapist and an Occupational Therapist that work with her and her classmates. Let me tell you how often I thank God for these therapists. I don't think I can say how much they mean to me and our family. These women (her therapists) are a very dedicated people who love children and give all they can to help their students succeed.

I am complimented all the time on how well my daughter is doing and always respond they same way- I don't do the work my daughter does. I review with her and put in place the work that her therapists have given me. I like to think that the best thing I have done for my daughter is to love her just as she is and try to have her live up to the same expectations that I have for her sisters. We also believe in helping others so we decided to join the Austism Society of the America this year. We are trying to raise money for Autism Society of America so if you are feeling generous go to our donation page today: http://www.autism-society.org/site/TR/Events/newsite-norightcolumn?px=2179173&pg=fund&fr_id=1040

Wow are you exhausted from reading this post, sorry if you are but thanks for listening!

Monday, September 8, 2008

A Shout out to Bob

Who is Bob? And why is he being written about on my blog. Well, Bob is a man who is reading the first book Twilight Series because his wife Emily loves them. And because Edward kidnapped Emily and Bob wants her back. Her is Bob's blog:

http://edwardkidnappedmywife.blogspot.com

I thank Bob for his male perspective on Twilight, he seems like an open and honest guy. Go read what he has to say its interesting.